Charlotte mom will run Boston as a pro. Then her kids will want French fries.
On Thursdays, Erin Del Giudice starts her long run at exactly 9:03 a.m.
Not 9. Not 9:15. Not whenever she feels like it.
9:03.
That’s when the window opens — eight minutes after she drops off her 4-year-old daughter Emma and her 2½-year-old son Noah at preschool, at precisely 8:55.
From there, she has roughly three hours until 12:15 pickup to fit in a long run that might stretch 20 miles or more. She runs out from the church where she leaves her kids and loops through Charlotte, often coming back just in time to resume the rest of her day as a stay-at-home mom.
That three-hour window is just the latest version of a routine she’s been building for years, one shaped by mileage and motherhood. And over time, the 32-year-old Davidson College alum has established herself as one of the fastest marathoners in the region — fast enough to land one of just 30 pro slots for American women in the pro field for Monday’s Boston Marathon.
It’s a unique feat, to say the least: While many of the women she’ll line up against in Hopkinton train like pros, live like pros and are paid like pros, Del Giudice squeezed her training in between snack time, stroller runs and preschool windows.
In her mind, though, that’s not a contradiction.
That’s the point.
‘I see myself as a normal person’
On paper, Del Giudice looks like an elite athlete.
She logs about 100 miles a week. Her long runs often come at paces that would qualify most people for Boston on their own. She’s already run the U.S. Olympic Trials Marathon once, right out of college in 2016; finished eighth at last June’s Grandma’s Marathon in Minnesota in a time of 2 hours, 37 minutes and 34 seconds, earning her the pro slot at Boston; and has the potential to punch her second ticket for the Trials on Monday now that the qualifying window for 2028 is officially open.
But ask her how she sees herself, and the answer comes quickly.
“A lot of people might see me as an elite runner, but I see myself as a normal person,” says Del Giudice (pronounced Judy-chay). “I’m just a regular person who likes to run. … And if there were no races and I had no talent at it whatsoever, and I was running the slowest miles of all-time, I would still love it, because I really just love the feeling of running.”
That perspective shapes how she trains.
While many runners at her level gravitate toward elite training groups, Del Giudice has spent nearly a decade coached by Kelly Fillnow, a former professional triathlete and fellow Davidson graduate who primarily trains non-elites. And while much of Del Giudice’s training happens on her own, Fillnow Coaching’s Tuesday night track sessions — which feature zero other elite participants — serve as her weekly anchor. (Full disclosure: I’m part of that group, and have known Del Giudice for years.)
For her, it’s a reminder that running is only one part of who she is. It’s also a safeguard.
“It’s really good to be in a training group that drives you to run faster,” she says. “But for me, just knowing my own personality, if I was in (an elite) group like that, I would probably become too Type A and over-focus and sort of self-implode a little bit. I think being in this group … gives you more freedom to think about the other parts of your life that are valuable.”
Namely her kids, who aren’t interested in splits or finishes or fields after a race.
“When I’m done, (they’re) like, ‘Great! You ran a race! That’s great! Can we, like, get some French fries?’”
Building a life that fits the miles
In juggling motherhood and running, there’s no perfectly optimized schedule for Del Giudice, but rather just patterns built around whatever the week allows.
Three early mornings, if possible. Stroller runs when needed. Those newly-moved-to-Thursday long runs. Occasional treadmill sessions when her husband, Sal, is traveling for work.
And a lot of improvisation.
On a Thursday a few weeks ago, she recalls, “I was all set to do my long run ... and then I took Noah’s temperature, and he had a fever. I was like, ‘Well, I guess you’re not going to school, so I’m not going running right now.’”
She pushed the run to Saturday. Adjusted. Moved on.
“I think I’ve gotten a lot better at that — changing plans at the last second … based on the mood of the crowd in the house. … (That) has allowed me to also relax about the whole process.”
It’s a mindset that came in part with time, and in part with circumstance.
“When you become a parent, you just have way less time to think about yourself than you used to, and it feels way less important to think about yourself,” says Del Giudice, who in addition to a bachelor’s degree from Davidson has a master’s from UNC Charlotte but quit her job teaching at a Charlotte private school after the birth of her first child.
“Having less mental energy to spend on thinking about running and spending it more on thinking about the kids has really just kind of freed me up to … maintain a healthy relationship with running, that maybe I didn’t have in the past. … I really feel like if you have other parts of your life — whether it’s your job, your family or some other hobby — to balance out what you’re trying to do athletically, it helps you become a better athlete.”
With less time to overanalyze, she focuses on the process instead of the noise. “Because you don’t have the energy to spend worrying over things that you can’t control.”
But that balance hasn’t come without friction.
‘We all needed happiness again’
Last year, her running goals were supplanted by something much more weighty and much more personal: the desire to grow her family, which came with its own painful set of challenges in the form of two miscarriages.
She sank into a funk for a stretch — until she found a way to reframe it, when her husband encouraged her to return to more-serious training and more-ambitious running goals. “He sort of realized that we all needed to reach a state of happiness again,” Del Giudice says, “regardless of the outcome of any goals or any race, success or not.
“He was like, ‘I think you’re just happier when you’re training for something, and maybe you just need to train for a little while and then we’ll revisit it.’”
So that’s what she’s doing — seeing what happens next.
“(I’m) just trying to stay in the season a little bit more of where I am,” she says. “We’d still like to have a third. That’s definitely one of our goals in the next years or so. But you just kind of have to hope that the chips fall how you want them to.
“And if they don’t, then you just tackle that when you get there.”
Embracing both sides of her life
For now, the motivation is simpler than it used to be. It’s also deeper.
It’s not about proving something — or even necessarily hitting a specific time. It’s about finding the edge of what’s possible within the life she has.
“I just have this sort of stubborn belief that I can always do a little bit more,” Del Giudice says. “And I think I just want to know, before I reach an age where my fitness starts declining ... what is the limit that I can do with the constraints that I have in my life?”
That means embracing both sides of her life, not choosing between them. And it means accepting that the outcome this Monday isn’t entirely in her control.
“If we get to Boston and I run 10 great miles, and then I have to, like, lay on the sidewalk and crawl, at least I will have been there, and I tried to do it, and I really gave it my all,” she says. “And I feel like just the process of improving myself is really what’s rewarding. Especially at this point in time. I feel like running, especially this winter and spring, has kind of allowed me to just get more comfortable in my own skin and also have a goal that’s separate of everything else that I do in my life.”
Because when the race is over, the rest of her life will still be waiting.
“We’re gonna come home and the kids have to go to the dentist on Wednesday,” she says, “and then they have school, and I’m supposed to bring a snack on Thursday, you know, it’s like, OK — onward. On to the next thing.”
Which, quite literally, will likely start right at 9:03.
